Articles by Jack M.Germain

Internet marketers have to walk a narrow line in pitching messages to potential customers during online visits. While marketers try to gather useful customer information to provide follow-up targeted messages, consumers often provide false answers to personal questions or will leave the Web site without pursuing a transaction Consumers often falsif...

Six months ago, enterprise IT managers had few, if any, choices for anti-spyware products that were not free or consumer grade offerings. Today, the enterprise landscape is drawing considerable attention from Internet security firms and software makers looking to tap into the anti-spyware marketplace Webroot Software is one of the first software se...

The e-mail mistake. Anybody using a computer has been there and done that. You add your name to a business message and click the Send button. The message leaves your screen just as your eye catches a glimpse of an error It used to be too late; that message was gone for good -- the Uh-Oh e-mail! No matter how much you cursed or cried about it, the r...

Using e-mail for personal and business correspondence has become as commonplace today as the VCR and the office water cooler. All three items are often taken for granted. Consumers have come to expect certain constants when it comes to computing: antivirus and firewall software are must-have security tools and e-mail should be free The notion of fr...

Imagine being able to have complete access to your hard drive and the corporate LAN in a device no bigger than a small cell phone No, Realm Systems isn't developing the next generation of the super small PDA. It just completed more than two years of research and development for a concept that will create the first generation of an innovative approa...

In October, IBM released its first ThinkPad with a built-in thumb print reader that tied a scanner device to a security chip for added security. Company officials heralded the new product amid high hopes that this first of its kind biometrics security subsystem will set a new standard for computer makers to follow The response has been so strong, o...

Biometrics technology is nothing new. Biometrics security devices have been available in one form or another for several decades with little fanfare. However, the prospects for developing biometrics as a reliable security device for consumer computers were viewed by many industry watchers as a nice idea with little applicable potential The use of b...

The arrival of the New Year finds software security firms scampering to create new products or adapt existing packages to protect the enterprise workplace from spyware. Even Microsoft has joined the fray with its mid-December acquisition of Giant Software and that company's innovative AntiSpyware package Microsoft has now released a beta version of...

Internet security firms are gearing up for an onslaught of new attacks that hackers will hurl at inboxes and Web sites As the computer industry awaits the release of Service Pack 2 of Microsoft's Windows XP -- which will feature improved security capabilities -- hackers are waiting too. They have spent the last 12 months mastering mobile attack tec...

As security holes continue to multiply in Microsoft's Internet Explorer browser, consumers and enterprise users alike are paying more attention to alternative browsers. After all, Microsoft hasn't upgraded its starship software package since before the release of Windows XP Numerous alternative browsers are now available to give Microsoft a run for...

Industry leaders in technology, banking, financial services and online auctioneering have joined forces with international law enforcement agencies to form Digital PhishNet, to tackle criminals "phishing" for online identity theft victims The Digital PhishNet initiative creates a single, unified line of communication between industry and law enforc...

Renewed interest in biometric security is heating up the cell phone industry in Asia. Industry watchers report that advanced security devices using biometrics are already popular in technology hungry countries in Asia and Europe However, new biometric products already available to businesses and consumers are lagging behind in the U.S. marketplace....

Move over all you unsolicited ads for Vicodin and Viagra. Make way senders of ads for phony Rolex watches and new mortgages. You are about to share in-box space with something much more ethereal. Spiritual spam is on the rise Managed e-mail and Internet security firm MessageLabs has spotted an emerging trend for unsolicited e-mail containing religi...

As attention focuses on the increasing spyware threats to enterprise networks, vendors are beginning to view the enterprise landscape as fertile ground for anti-spyware protection Webroot Software, a developer of Internet privacy and protection software, recently completed the first audit of spyware in the enterprise. The audit found more than 20 s...

A new generation of anti-spam artillery is helping Internet Service Providers fight more successful battles in the war against spammers IronPort Systems is arming some of the largest ISPs with a new type of Reputation Filter powered by the SenderBase E-mail Traffic Monitoring Network. This filtering system gives the computer industry a new tool in ...

In the not-too-distant past, search toolbars were risky specialty add-ons offered by Internet marketing mavens. Users who installed search toolbars often were granting permission without knowing it to intruders harvesting data on addresses and surfing habits and opening the backdoor to their computers Spyware typically went hand-in-hand with toolba...

For years there existed a fuzzy distinction between good and bad computer hackers. Black Hat hackers were known to crack into computer systems for the challenge and the bragging rights. These miscreants took great pleasure from wreaking havoc once they gained entry. White Hat hackers, on the other side of the ethical line, broke into systems to alert company officials to their ineffective security measures. As concerns about network security grew, computer security companies sprung up and often recruited their experts from the ranks of the White Hatters...

Spyware and its intimate partner, adware, are among the fastest growing threats to computer users. Many Internet security experts now view spyware and adware as variations of the same thing -- intrusion Industry analysts say spyware and adware together infect at least 90 percent of all Internet-connected PCs. The number of malcreants doing the spyi...

Today is the federally mandated deadline for investment companies and other publicly owned firms to be in compliance with internal auditing controls stipulated by the Sarbanes-Oxley (SOX) Act of 2004. However, it appears many companies might miss the deadline Under terms of the SOX law, otherwise known as the Public Company Accounting Reform and In...

Some Internet security experts don't place much hope for pending antiphishing legislation to do much to prevent ID theft and related scams. They view the prospect of new laws as being too little, too late to stop an out-of-control problem Phishing scams trick e-mail recipients into clicking a link in the message to reach a vendor's Web site, where ...